A Warwickshire animal rights activist hopes the discovery of the deadly Sars virus in wild animal markets in China will bring an end to the barbaric treatment of the creatures.

Dave Neale, who grew up in Bedworth and is now the UK Director of the Animals Asia Foundation, is fighting to ban animal markets in China. Here dogs, cats and wild beasts are caught in traps, held in small cages - often with exposed wounds - and then boiled alive for food.

He described the markets as ?hellholes?.

This week?s confirmed case of Sars in China caused the closure of wild animal markets in the Guangdong province. Animal investigators from Animals Asia saw the animals caged together before being barbarically slaughtered, with blood, gut contents, faeces and urine ending up spread around the same area where food is served.

Mr Neale hopes the closure will mark a permanent change in a system which could help breed diseases such as Sars.

He said: ?The fact is, we don?t really know what diseases will come from these wild animals, including Sars.

?It could be passed on from the way dogs and cats are slaughtered in these markets, which is barbaric. Dogs and cats are often boiled alive.?

Despite new Chinese government guidelines which require only farmed animals to be sold in the markets, Mr Neale said many of the cats, dogs and other animals had clearly been snared in the wild - some had legs missing and exposed bones from where they had been roughly pulled out of traps.

Animals Asia is appealing to the Chinese authorities to kill these animals in the most humane way possible.